1. Technical Field
This invention relates to vehicles and, more particularly, to plastic modular doors for land vehicles.
2. Discussion
Modular door assemblies for land vehicles are generally known in the art. Such modular door assemblies typically include inner and outer panels that are fixed together to form a hollow shell structure in which the door's piece of window glass and associated hardware components are located. The hardware components typically include a window regulator unit, a locking mechanism, and other electrical and mechanical assemblies required for a particular door application. Unfortunately, these hardware components are commonly inserted through relatively small access openings in the inner panel and attached thereto during the on-line assembly process. Often, this is an awkward process to be performed during the on-line assembly process.
It is known to form the outer panel of a door for a land vehicle from a plastic material due to its light weight characteristics. Unfortunately, the use of this type of outer panel also typically requires some type of inner panel structure made from metal, such as steel or the like, to provide structural support and rigidity to the door. This approach leads to problems of attaching the metal inner panel to the plastic outer panel as well as other on-line assembly problems. Additionally, the use of a totally metal inner panel structure increases the overall weight of the door and the vehicle to which it is ultimately attached.
It is therefore desirable to provide a modular door for a land vehicle that minimizes the use of metal structures while exhibiting high rigidity and strength characteristics.
More particularly, it is desirable to provide a modular door for a land vehicle including a plastic outer skin member as well as a plastic intermediate shell that are adhesively bonded to one another to form a door subassembly in order to reduce the weight of the door as well as the overall weight of the vehicle to which it is attached.
It is further desirable to provide a modular door including the above-referenced door subassembly that is secured to the body of a partially assembled vehicle for simultaneous application of paint to the door subassembly and the body during the on-line assembly process.
Yet, it is also desirable to provide a carrier plate assembly that carries a piece of window glass and associated door hardware components that may be assembled off-line and mechanically attached to the door subassembly after the application of the paint during the on-line assembly process.